spotless:

Got rewarded N5,000 for participating in the competition. thanks alot mr seun.

really? @oga seun, i saw your mail selecting me among the one's to be compensated with 5k. I replied your mail and havent got a reply nor a notification whether its paid or not. Just want to know if u got the mail and compensated me or not cos i got no bank alert yet,pls do reply this post, thanks. The email: shantyboy44@yahoo.com

Hehehehe. I didn't even come back to see all your insults. I am a pile of poo all because my opinion differs. If you gave me a million, I will take my chances.



I rated the dude's entry on the creativity. Nothing more. I didn't call it a plan neither did I call it an essay. I didn't like his idea that relies on a government and officials of schools but in order to keep my post short enough, yet passing the message, I decided not to touch on many things. I touched mainly on the good parts. However I didn't forget to put this when I started,

Now don't get me wrong, a few of the things he has written may be far fetched.

Even though I did, I expect you not to see this because like you said, you didn't finish reading.


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What Emmanuel has over Spotless is coherence, planning and literal arrangement. In terms of developing a good idea, he has not done any better than Spotless. A few nicely put words has nothing to do with a proper business plan. Take a look at these few examples.

1. PLANNING & PRICING

Emmanuel has decided he will target Medical books because they are costly. Other items he intends to stock include professional studies books, e.g (ICAN), JAMB, WAEC, . . . Yet in his final paragraph he states that his budget is 600,000. If the average cost price of a single book comes at N1,000 (gross underestimate), that's a paltry 600 books. If we have decently, 6 categories of books, that's 100 books per category. Seriously?

Secondly, considering the fact that most students rent books for a term/semester, what deadline do you give?  2 weeks? 1 month? Most professional studies students will want the book for the entire time they are studying, usually an average of 3 months. THat seems to be the same length Secondary Schools and University students will want a book for. Now at Emmanuel's target price, 40-70% of cost price of books, if you implement a month's deadline, and the customer needs the books 3 times in a term it means that at 40% of the cost of the book, you are asking the customer to pay 120% of the cost of the book in one session. . .That's past the cost of owning the book. . .Seriously? Is this even a plan? Who approves and rates this?  That's a major fail and the business is DOA. Is this what you mean by he's spent time on it?
Is it even totally thought through?

Now let's stick to study duration model which is an average of 3 months which means a student will typically want to borrow a book and keep for a whole semester/study duration i.e. 3months and also consider that 40% is the only figure that can be worked with as no sane person will rent a book at 70% of cost price;  at 40% price point per book rental, total revenue from book rentals over a period of three months = 40% of the total cost price of all books(N600,000) which is N240,000 - Which in turn equals 80,000 a month. Bear in mind this is revenue. Not profit and this is working on the assumption that all books are rented

Now Emmanuel wants to employ two members of staff, will pay for electricity, amortize the cost of the store over the year and all other running costs, are you telling me this is your idea of a "self sustaining business" ? Mr Business Executive, Is this your idea of being creative? An array of carefully plotted sentences don't translate to good business idea. Now considering the fact that rental price point of 40% of cost of books is grossly infeasible, how much less do you think revenue will come to?

Now also consider that revenue of 80,000 is a hugely inflated by the much depressed N1,000 average cost price of book. How does this affect revenue with a budget of 600,000 when Emmanuel's prime target market (medical) have books that cost as much as £20 - £300 per book? That's N5,000 - N75,000 per book.


2.  IDENTIFICATION

Emmanuel's idea is to register customers with a passport, driver's license, student's ID card. . . . Is there any consideration that these docs can be faked? What do you have in mind to stop an expelled student with a Student's ID and a fake NEPA Bill from borrowing a N3,000 book for another student who then doesn't return the book? As a private business person, what is the plan if your customers deface the book, tear off the pages or lose the book entirely? That's your whole N600,000 gone. . . How do you get back your money? Call the police? What's the effect of this on your N80,000/Month revenue? Business Executive is this your idea of "sustainable"?



3. STAFF

Emmanuel wants a system where a customer calls to rent a book for a fee. However, at what point is this payment made? There is no online payment system in Nigeria so I assume the payment is made at the door of the customer when the Casual staff has journeyed to the customer's house. Seriously? So what if the customer decides they don't want the book any more or it's the wrong book? Who pays for the transport to and fro? Are you going to force the customer to pay for what they refuse? Haha! Big hole in the business plan eh? Lemme show you an even bigger one.

Your staff will notice this and use this as an avenue to steal from the business by faking customers who have refused service on getting to their door step. . . They pocket the transport money and cost you for maintaining the phone at the same time. . . Is this your idea of sustainable?

Lemme throw one more big hole in it. . . How do you prevent your staff from making the rental money for themselves? Who accounts for books rented and cross-checks figures against events? What if your staff totally erase any records of any rentals? How do you know? I mean you have 1,000 books. . . Are you going to hire an independent auditor who comes in every evening before closure and counts every single book against rental events? Is this even a sustainable process? What if you have 3,000 books? Employ two auditors? So what's to stop the auditors from colluding with your staff?

Another example. Someone comes in, borrows a book. Your staff buy that same book and put on the shelf, so everyone who asks for that book gets their own copy and they pocket that, they get rich renting out their own books at your expense? What's to stop them?

All from your meagre revenue? I have not even done a research just a few things off the top off my head Mr Business Executive . . . . . I must ask though, Is this your idea of a business that's sustainable? A nice collection of very well articulated sentences don't equal a good business plan and this in your idea deserves more than N15,000. . . Seriously?

youngwiz:

really? @oga seun, i saw your mail selecting me among the one's to be compensated with 5k. I replied your mail and havent got a reply nor a notification whether its paid or not. Just want to know if u got the mail and compensated me or not cos i got no bank alert yet,pls do reply this post, thanks. The email: shantyboy44@yahoo.com

I've not made your payment yet.  There are just 2 more people I need to pay. "Shanty Boy" and Paulyne.

Hmmmmm. I read something very creative in Spotless' post. I wouldn't say what exactly but good job man.


I will actually think deeply about it first . . . .


Nice one. Take care

Seun:

I've not made your payment yet.  There are just 2 more people I need to pay. "Shanty Boy" and Paulyne.

oh, thanks for the reply, peace!

Okay I finally finished the spotless entry to give him the much needed benefit of doubt but I got the same feeling like my previous post. The writer based 90% of his plan on poor assumptions. Lets brush the online stuff aside (its already a failure as I explained) Talking about ATM payment. You will agree that it is #1 risky for the clients and am not sure you would like to go through the whole modalities and I think Mr. emmanuel explained that well in his write up. Everybody is afraid of internet scam and how will I trust a low budget business starter with my ban details? Banks will not even allow that. #fail
He talked about renting DVD's for #350 and have it delievered by post in a country with a dead mail system, when one can buy the same product at #150
He is spending 750K on ebooks alone without no checks and balances? No marketing/orientation yet? No structuters yet? No logistics yet?

, continued) the writer did not say if he will be running this alone or with a staff? If he will operate from his room or get a secretariat? His escape if he gets turned down by schools and government? There was no target. The fact he estimated 18 million in profits from a 1 million business within no time frame tells me he has no knowledge on the process. Still assumption. No premise, No structure, Poor calculations. Poor planning. I still have others but let me stop here. Now Emmanuel had presentation, a foresight, a target, a framework, a plan, escapes and some 'checks and balances'. He gave a biz plan you can start NOW and start making profits with a million or MORE (I think his plan will work with MoRE). A structure a business can grow on. Infact he brought the business to my door with some innovations Every Nigerian can easily identify with. This guy should submit this to that YoUWIN stuff I saw online. It is straightforward. I wish I can rate the 2ND Entry. Seun at post the entries you paid for, the 5K's.
Peace out

hey Mr Globe, i think its about time you write an essay and paste it for everyone to see.

L
M
A
O

Mr. Globe:

He gave a biz plan you can start NOW and start making profits with a million or MORE.

This just sums you up. Did you even read my post? Please come back and tell us where the profit is coming from if you dare.
With his plan, you'd be lucky to break even.

nateevs:



With his plan, you'd be lucky to break even.

He wouldn't

Thinking of starting another competition soon.

nateves I hope you have peeped this thread www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-789417.0.html Thats what will happen to your business when like Emmanuel rightly said you run ahead of your market. They had the financial muscle, the marketing dollars, the strategy and everything working for them but no market analysis. They should have known Nigeria wasn't ripe for online biz.
Seun, if you are considering a next then don't make it anything of the mess this was. Plan it, know what you want, make up you mind and up the prize so it would be a bit competitive and interesting and so you wouldn't post the second winner smh?

Seun, how far na?

how can i participate

How can we participate?

Seun:
Business Essay Contest: Starting A Chain Of For-Profit Libraries In Nigeria

Hello,

Let's say you were given 1 million naira to set up a profitable chain of shops where the great books, especially non-fiction books, can be borrowed by paying customers.  I'd like you to write an essay on how you would start such a business with just 1 million naira, and make it grow to a predominant position in Nigeria with no additional funding.  And send it to [/b].

Your essay will be judged based on the soundness of your business strategy as described in the essay.  The winning essay will be the one which best demonstrates that the writer knows exactly what it will take to start and run a profitable book lending business in Nigeria.  The following elements might help: honesty, passion, rigor, research, profit-mindedness, pragmatism, accurate numbers, and other details.  But we'll be judging the plan/strategy in your essay as a whole.

The prizes are as follows: The writer of the the best essay as explained above will win [b]60,000 naira, the runner-up 30,000 naira, and the 3rd best 15,000 naira.  The contest starts now, but submissions will be accepted between the Monday the 10th and Friday the 14th of October, 2011.  The winners will be announced on Monday, the 17th of October, 2011 and awarded their prizes by direct deposit into their bank accounts.

I would strongly recommend that you try to understand the business models of Netflix and Blockbuster, even though they don't lend books and their business models probably won't work in Nigeria anyway.  If you're interested in running such a business, you should consider sending your CV with the essay. 

Any questions?  Good luck!

Regards,
Seun Osewa <[/b]>

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[b]October 7 UPDATE: I've decided to continue with the competition but expand its scope a little bit:
1) The contest is not limited to books anymore. You can pitch a business that lends DVDs, CDs, and any other types of media in addition to or instead of books.
2) The contest is not limited to physical media anymore. You can pitch a business that lets people 'borrow' ebooks, stream movies/tv/music, etc.
3) You don't necessarily have to setup a chain of stores. A single store might suffice, if it enjoys a lot of traffic.
4) The stores need not be physical. They can be online stores, etc.

Good luck!

Bros I need your email address now please I need you to do something for me ooo